India’s Human-Elephant Conflict Rages

Last week, two elephants ran amok in the city of Mysore, killing a man and injuring several others. The two elephants, which were separated from their herd on the outskirts of the city, also injured and mauled many cows.

The incident once again highlights the fragile nature of the co-existence between people and elephants - a relationship that is becoming increasingly strained as human development impinges on the natural habitat of the animals.

Reuters

A rampaging elephant stepped over a fence in the southern Indian city of Mysore last Wednesday.

There are some 26,000 wild elephants in India. According to a report by the Elephant Task Force, which was set up in 2010, roughly 400 people in India are killed every year by elephants. Retaliatory killings lead to 100 elephant deaths, on average, while many others are poisoned by farmers trying to protect their crops.

The number of elephant attacks in India is on the rise, especially in the country’s northeast and south, where the majority of wild elephants live. In 2008, an elephant killed three people at a temple ceremony in Kerala, and in December 2010 a herd of 70 elephants - intoxicated after drinking from barrels of rice beer - went on a drunken rampage through a village, killing four people and destroying 60 homes.

This violent behavior by elephants – often seen as gentle giants - isn’t unprovoked. India’s numerous development projects, such as building new roads and houses, and an intensification in agriculture have encroached upon and fragmented elephant habitats, notably forests.

"The problem is that home ranges are imprinted in the mind of an elephant and that won’t change even if the forest is reduced or a farmer cultivates there," said Dr. Sushant Chaudhary, a faculty member at the Wildlife Institute of India specializing in elephants.

"This increasing interaction between humans and elephants leads to more and more aggressiveness on their part," said Dr. Chaudhary, who was also one of the contributors of the Elephant Task Force report submitted to the Ministry of Environment and Forests in 2010.

The two elephants that went on a rampage in Mysore were separated from their herd after farmers threw stones at them as they entered a field on the outskirts of the city.

Dr. Chaudhary said that only 28% of India’s elephants remain within protected areas. Ideally, a population of 100 elephants needs 5,000 square kilometers of protected area for normal development, he said.

"The remaining elephant landscapes need to be conserved and local communities should be involved in the efforts in order to solve the issue comprehensibly," he said.

In order to protect the country’s elephant population, the Ministry of Environment and Forests formed an Elephant Task Force in 2010, which aims to secure elephant landscapes, prevent poaching, recognize human-elephant conflict zones, create task forces to develop and oversee projects, provide relief packages for people involved in attacks and to take a global lead in elephant conservation.

As India pushes forward with development, elephant habitats will come under further threat. Perhaps the Elephant Task Force could take a leaf from the Tiger Task Force, which brought the issue of tiger endangerment to the spotlight, ultimately leading to an increase in the tiger population. According to the latest census, the number of tigers in India has risen to 1,706 from 1,411 in 2006.

More steps are needed, including closing the loopholes in the Wildlife Protection Act that have left many elephant habitats unprotected, so that further casualties – both human and elephant – can be avoided.